Wading through life

I’m continually amazed at personality tests. This one, the PersonalDNA test, was one of the most ambiguous to date, but it still figured me out pretty well. Without further ado, here I am:

It labels me the Respectful Leader and equates me to the Myers-Briggs ISTP.

Reading up a bit on the Myers-Briggs on the almighty Wikipedia, ISTPs, along with the rest of the personalities, have associated “personality archtypes” and “temperments.” The archtype is “crafter,” which makes a lot of sense and goes right along with my lead Kolbe Index striving instint to build stuff.

And my temperment is an artisan; we “seek freedom to act and are concerned with their ability to make an impact on people or situations. Their greatest strength is tactical intelligence, which means that they excel at acting, composing, producing, and motivating.”

Sorry for being rather lame this past week. As usual, it wasn’t that I didn’t have anything to write about; I did and do. I just didn’t do it.

So, here are some delayed reflections about worship I’ve been milling over.

I went to a pretty powerful Third Day / David Crowder Band concert on Sunday (that’s two Sunday’s ago) with Otis. Enjoyed it a bunch. The only thing I kinda struggled with is that many people whom I was sitting in proximity with were there to take in a concert and be entertained, while I was there primarily to worship. I guess that’s to be expected; it was a concert after all. But I’ve become so addicted to worshiping the Lord that it’s pretty darn hard for me to turn down any opportunity. I mean, com’on… who wouldn’t want to engage in a worship exerience led by some of the best in the business?

So, I for sure engaged in some worship… even with people talking and playing Tetris on cell phones during songs like “Show Me Your Glory.”

On a related note, the chapter in Drawing Near I read in preparation for small group on Tuesday is all about true worship. And of course worship is really a lifestyle, not something that is done solely on Sunday mornings or at concerts or in the car. But there certainly is a time for expressive worship. We’re supposed to enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise, remember.

One of the things I love about David Crowder, as I shared with my friend Jen on the way back from church today, is that he stretches his audience with his worship leading. He does songs like Sing Like the Saved, Make a Joyful Noise/I Will Not Be Silent, Undignified, Our Love is Loud and others and makes sure to get the audience to abandon the hypocricy of singing something and not actually doing it.

That’s something I can’t stand… and have certainly done before… and fall into from time to time. But seriously… you think the Lord really wants to hear you “Sing Like the Saved” quietly or reverently? You’re supposed to sing LIKE YOU’RE SAVED! SAVED FROM ETERNAL DAMNATION AND INTO HIS GLORIOUS KINGDOM! That means something!

When Crowder started crunching out the chords for that song as his last at the concert, I thought to myself “Crap… now I have to get all uncomfortable. I’m not used to being overly-expressive in front of Otis.” Seriously… that’s what I thought :-/ But, I’m learning to set that stuff aside and just do what I know is in my heart to do. And it’s not to just stand there and sing along–especially when the song wraps up with “We’re going to dance like the saved!”

Or how about Undignified? “I will dance / I will sing / To be mad for my king / Nothing Lord is hindering this passion in my soul / I’ll become even more undignified than this / some may say it’s foolishness.” I guess an option would be to not sing it at all if you aren’t willing to actually be undignified. But what would the spirit be behind not singing? Seems to me it would be welling from a lot of selfishness and pride. We have to be willing to go all the way for the Lord. And believe me, I’m not where I need to be with this either. But I am pushing myself and allowing myself to be stretched.

One last thing that relates: I read a short article by Louie Giglio, the founder and leader of the Passion worship conferences and 268 Generation movement, in a recent CCM. It was awesome to read about the focus of the ministry remaining on establishing God’s renown. As I sometimes become critial of most-things-mainstream, it was great to read about something that is experiencing vast success and isn’t settling; it still seems to be all about the Lord. And that is refreshing.

Giglio wrapped up the article by sharing a story about a speach he gave to a couple thousand students in the ministry’s early years. As he was speaking about the focus of Passion–which is based on Isaiah 26:8 which says “your name and your renown are the desire of our hearts”–a girl stood up and started clapping all by herself. He remembered it being a rather awkward situation for the audience. Nobody knew what to do and nobody joined her. But it sure stuck in Giglio’s head; and I’m sure it stuck out to God.

Isn’t that exactly what we’re to do for the Lord… set aside all awkwardness and just give him glory, even if it’s just us and nobody else joins in? Are we willing to do that? Will we set ourselves out on a limb for him… exposed before all and completely vulnerable? Because that’s what He did for us: he surrendered it all, letting people beat him and strip him naked and then nail him to a cross. He was completely exposed, mocked, ridiculed, bruised and scorned for the stuff we’ve done. And we think we’re to be dignified, calm and reverent about it all…

I fought it Sunday at church. We were praying before the main service and a couple times I just wanted to burst out in praise and thanksgiving and just acknowledgement of God’s glory and I didn’t. I let some of it out, but certainly not all that was within me. Too awkward; I thought about it too much. And with me, the more I think about something that I’m not real comfortable doing, the less likely I am to do it. I need to just do things God is inviting me into.

And ask God questions about it later… or never.

Yo’el. That’s the Hebrew Joel, according to Wikipedia.

I’ve known for quite some time that Joel means, in one form or another, “Jehova is God.” Some say “Jehovah is Lord”, or “Yahweh is God”… “God is willing” is rolled in there in some descriptions as well.

But it all comes down to two elements: yo and el. And those are pretty much the two names of God: Yahweh (Yo) and Elohim (El). So, stripped of it’s Jehovah-GOD-God-LORD-Lord complexities, it means: “Yahweh is Elohim.” (Interestingly enough, Elijah means the inverse: Elohim is Yahweh.)

This works quite nicely with the writings of the prophet Joel himself. He writes in 2:23:

Be glad (8798) then, ye children of Zion, and rejoice (8798) in the LORD your God: for he hath given (8804) you the former rain moderately, and he will cause to come down (8686) for you the rain, the former rain, and the latter rain in the first month.

The LORD and God are Yahweh and Elohim, respectively.

Now, apparently there is some struggle going on in seminary-circles about if Jehovah or Yahweh is more proper. If you click on LORD in the passage above, you’ll see that Studylight.org translates it as “Jehovah = the existent one; the proper name for the one true God”. You should also see that there are four characters that make up this Hebrew name for God. Translated into English, they are YHWH–Yahweh without the consonants vowels. Hebrew scribes wrote without consonants vowels.

It of course isn’t that simple. The graphic to the right is a visual of the translational mess the Wikipedia article discusses. It involves all sorts of things I don’t have a clue about, including the Jews avoidance of speaking the proper name of God, lest they “take the LORD’s name in vain” and be struck dead. I guess Adonai developed as a result.

Jehovah’s Witnesses even have a say in the matter and have their own interpretation that some consider blasphemous. I had no idea this was such an issue.

But when you think about it, names are pretty darn important. Less so now than they were then, but still quite important. Names carry meaning. And if we take into account that our words have power as scripture says, when we repeatedly address a person by his or her name, and that name carries meaning, then we shape that person’s reality and our relationship with him or her.

There was a reason God changed people’s names, such as Abraham and Paul. And it wasn’t because He was bored. It meant something. And there is a reason that He has a unique name for each of us He will reveal in heaven. Because it means something. Name changes represent self-change and relationship-with-God change.

So, in summary, I’d kinda like to know what God’s real name is. You know how annoying it is for someone to repeatedly get your name wrong (my last name isn’t Mowst! …and Sherry’s name isn’t Sharron! …and Krista isn’t Crystal, or Kristen!)

And lastly… if I were to get a tattoo, it would be this: Yahweh Elohim, the meaning of my name, written in Hebrew:

I finally broke down and ordered Season 4 of 24 and it is currently waiting for me at work. I’m geeked. Though, I probably won’t be able to get started on it for a week or two. Have to keep priorities in order.

Jesus, relationships, work, side work, working out, then maybe 24…

Sorry, Jack, there’s another man in my life.

You can check out photos from my trip to Mississippi and Lousiana here: http://photos.joelmaust.com/Travel/160080

There are two galleries there: one of my photos and another of Doug Buehler’s. We shared. I’ll try to briefly caption some of them.

Pretty grim situation down there, as I indicated in my previous blog. Just a lot of work to be done. And yet it is so easy to fade back into routine… I’m greatful for the opportunities to share with people what I saw on the trip to instill within my mind what reality is for the people of Meridian and the gulf coast.

A former member of our small group, who moved away recently, went on missions trip to Mexico last summer and was really impacted by it. When she came back, she teared up when sharing because she feared slipping back into the grove so much. She requested our help in holding her accountable to what she experienced.

I really respected that, because she acknowledged our tendency to slip back. Most anyone who’s gone on a mission trip or a service project knows what I’m talking about. We have to be intentional. We have to show peopel the pictures, we have to tell the stories, we have to journal our thoughts… Day-to-day life is just too demanding for us to not to.

So, I share with you these pictures. Hope it gives you a taste. There will be some videos on there as well that I took from the van while driving along the Mississippi shore line.